1. Technical Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a telecommunications system and, in particular, to the restriction of incoming forwarded calls from certain designated numbers.
2. Description of Related Art
With the wide spread availability of call forwarding subscriber features within a telecommunications system, a subscriber is able to forward incoming calls to a particular forward-to number. After activating a particular call forwarding feature by providing a forward-to directory number to a serving switching system, the serving switching system automatically reroutes incoming calls to the provided forward-to number. All or some of the subscriber's incoming calls can be forwarded, depending upon the activated call forwarding feature. For example, incoming calls to the subscriber can be forwarded only when the line is busy, as provided by the Call Forwarding on Busy (CFB) feature, or only when the line is not answered, as provided by the Call Forward Don't Answer (CFDA) feature. Even though the conventional call forwarding features enable a telecommunications subscriber to conveniently forward an incoming call to a forward-to number, there still exists certain undesirable characteristics and limitations imposed by these call forwarding features.
For example, due to human error, the subscriber may incorrectly enter the forward-to number. The result of the incorrect entry is that the wrong telecommunications subscriber is forced to answer and screen these forwarded calls. If the telecommunications terminal forwarding the calls is a high volume terminal, such as a customer service line or a distributor's line, the telecommunications subscriber incorrectly receiving the forwarded calls is greatly burdened. For example, the party receiving the incorrectly forwarded calls might be a small business. If a distributor associated with the small business forwards its calls to the small business, daily operations at that small business are greatly disrupted because the employees are forced to constantly answer and screen incoming calls forwarded by the distributor.
A number of implementations have been developed to alleviate some of the problems and limitations imposed by the above scenario. One such implementation enables the telecommunications subscriber receiving the incorrectly forwarded calls to block all incoming calls from the forwarding number. Unfortunately, this option also blocks direct calls originated by the forwarding number. This option is, accordingly, acceptable as long as the ability for the distributor to dial the small business directly is unimportant. If, however, the direct calls from the distributor are important, the small business has no option but to accept all calls from the distributor and wastefully devote resources to answer and screen the incorrectly forwarded calls. Accordingly, there is a need for an improved and more selective mechanism to bar forwarded calls from a particular forwarded-from number.